Old pictures – the closest thing we have perhaps to a time machine. You must have once sat beside your parents when they discovered their batch photos from their class WhatsApp group and couldn’t stop talking about it. They must have given you a description of everyone from that picture, who was in their close circle, had a crush on them (they seldom tell you who they had a crush on), with whom they picked a fight once, and who became an over-achiever against all odds.
However, there are some batches where the students beat the law of averages and a majority of them go on to do extremely well in life. One such group of people can be seen in a picture that has been recently going viral on the internet. You can see stellar actors like Jaideep Ahlawat, Rajkummar Rao, Vijay Varma, and Sunny Hinduja posing for a picture from their FTII days in 2005. They were all part of the acting program.
With his recently released Paatal Lok Season 2, Jaideep has again proved why he is considered a generational talent. His outstanding performances in movies like Raazi, Three of Us, An Action Hero, and Jaane Jaan further add to his case. From Shahid to Stree, from Citylights to Newton, Rajkummar has a diverse range of roles that many can only dream of.
Vijay Varma’s breakthrough role came in Gully Boy, and since then there’s no stopping him with films and shows like Darlings, Dahaad, IC 814: The Kandahar Hijack. Our beloved Sandeep Bhaiya aka Sunny Hinduja has been a heartthrob in the OTT space with The Family Man, Chacha Vidhayak Hain Humare, and Aspirants.
The internet was pleasantly surprised to see that so many talented actors once trained in the same classroom.
However, these four are not the only ones who have been successful stars from their batch. Sunny had revealed in an interview from 2023 about the other members from their batch.
This includes, among many others, Sunny’s wife Shinjini Raval (known for Delhi Belly, Aranyak, and Peddlers). Their batch also had Jaswant Dalal (NH 10, Farzi), Varun Verma (Rustom), and Nayani Dixit (Delhi Belly, Special 26, Queen). We found a list of all the students from the batch of 2005 from ftiipeople.com.
What a great feeling it must be for this talented bunch to be reliving their college nostalgia with their current co-workers!
